5 techniques to effectively convert visitors to customers

Every page on your site should have a call to action; a response you want visitors to complete.

But how do you encourage users to act? How do you create an effective call to action?

The effectiveness of your site should not be measured by traffic but by the number of visitors you convert to paying customers. Every page on your site should have an objective it wants users to complete. whether it is filling in a contact form, requesting a quote, scheduling service, downloading a checklist, etc.

A call to action provides…

Focus to your page
A way to measure your sites success
Direction to your users

How then do you create an effective call to action? Here are 5 techniques which help achieve just that.

#1 Use Active Urgent Language

A call to action should clearly tell users what you want them to do. They should include active words such as:

Call
Register
Schedule
Download

All of these encourage users to take an action.

#2 Get the Position Right

Another important factor is the position of your call to action on the page. Ideally it should be placed high on the page and in the central column.

#3 Use White Space

It is not just the position of your call to action that matters. It is also the space around it. The more space around a call to action the more attention is drawn to it. Clutter up your call to action with surrounding content and it will be lost in the overall noise of the page.

#4 Use An Alternative Color

Color is an effective way of drawing attention to elements, especially if the rest of the site has a fairly limited palette.

#5 Make It Big

As web designers we often get annoyed with clients who ask us to make things bigger. It is certainly true that size isn’t everything. We have already established that position, color and white space are equally important.

However it cannot be denied that size does play a large part. The bigger your call to action, the more chance it will be noticed.

Conclusion

An effective call to action is the key to a successful site and involves a combination of best practice in usability, creative design and powerful copy writing.

When done right it generates measurable return on investment, and in the current economic climate that is what we all want.